Unhappy New Year’s Day - 1. Unhappy New Year’s Day

Detective Gennaro Saggio was happy he had Christmas off. The trade-off was that he needed to work New Year’s Day. Nothing really wrong with that, New Year’s Day is typically quiet from a major crime perspective. He settled in at his desk to catch up on some long overdue paperwork.

He’d just finished transcribing an interview he’d done three days ago when his email alert sounded. A few seconds after opening the email, he thought, ‘I should have stayed in bed’. Although his next thought was, ‘No, the body will just get colder, and since the email was addressed directly to me, I’d be on the case anyway.' Turns out it really just would have gotten warmer.

Then, he voiced his reaction, “That’s fucked up.”

His new partner, Simon Gallagher, heard him, “What’s fucked up?”

Gennaro turned his monitor so Simon could see it. The opening was a play on words, his last name translating into English as wise.

‘Dear Wise Detective Saggio,

You have won the prize of investigating the year’s first murder. Congratulations. You’ll find the victim in an abandoned warehouse. I won’t tell you where, so you’ll have to figure it out from this clue:

Referee.

If you hurry, you may yet be able to save him. Well, no, you won’t.

OOOI’

Simon suggested, “Prank?”

“Maybe. What can Referee mean?”

“Something to do with football?”

“Lots of sports use a referee, Simon.”

“So, sports in general.”

“See if you can find a sports related business that moved out of a warehouse.”

“Wait. Sports Authority went out of business a few years ago. I think they had a warehouse in the Third Avenue Industrial Complex.”

“Saddle up. I’ll dig up the address while you’re driving.”

Gennaro found the address easily. They circled the building once in the car, searching for a point of ingress. One door was damaged, and the lock removed. Simon parked the car, and they walked in.

Simon spoke first, “No awful smells.”

“No, but it does smell like a backyard barbecue.”

Meat was indeed cooking. They located the victim in an adjacent office, handcuffed in a still running tanning bed. There was an apparent suicide note on the desk, but it was obvious the victim didn't write it. There was no red crayon anywhere to be found, and the tanning bed was chained shut.

'I really did set that fire; our District Attorney blew the case. But I'm making sure I get what I deserve by killing myself in a horrible way. Adrian Keller'

"Well, we won't need to figure out who he was."

"Let's let the autopsy confirm that before we make any assumptions, Simon."

"Sure. Sorry."

Simon was still a fairly new detective. Gennaro had a lot to teach him, apparently.

They secured the scene, called their crime scene on-call, and the coroner. Unfortunately, they needed to keep Adrian cooking, turning off or unplugging the bed could have ruined fingerprints. It was a needless worry. There weren't any fingerprints. There was nothing to identify the killer in any way.

***************** Disturbing text warning *******************

The autopsy proved the victim was indeed Adrian Keller. The autopsy also determined Adrian was dead before he was placed in the tanning bed. The time of death was sometime between four and eight PM on the thirty-first of December. Not all of the burns were caused by the tanning bed. The cause of death was due to severe burns to the face and head. The coroner determined those burns were caused by a torch, likely a Bernzomatic torch, using Oxy/MAP-Pro fuel. (1)

***************** End of disturbing text ********************

A week later, Detective Saggio was stuck. He and Simon checked out everyone they felt would have been angry enough with Keller to want him dead. The owner of the business he allegedly torched had an alibi confirmed by a few others, namely the rest of the employees of the company. The immediate family members of the murdered gentleman were also excluded. One item in the so-called suicide note bothered him though. The phrasing 'our District Attorney' was curious. Was the killer somehow associated with the DA's office, or worse yet, the police department? Either case was a disturbing thought. All fifteen other members of the Orono PD, excepting Saggio himself, and twelve members of the DA's office staff all needed to be excluded.

Unfortunately, for Detective Saggio, this was not something he could trust to anyone else. It would be troublesome if the person he asked to check any others out was the murderer him or herself. So, he had to clear that part of the investigation with his Captain, Captain Paris, and possibly with the Chief, Chief Irving. He had to believe neither of those men were involved. It was a risk, but if he went off the reservation and did a rogue investigation without their knowledge, it could mean his job. He knocked on his Captain's door.

"Enter."

"Good morning, Captain Paris."

"Hello detective. How is the Tanning Bed case going?"

"Not well. I've hit a wall and have to get creative."

"Okay. In what way?"

"All the obvious suspects have solid alibis. The note at the scene refers to 'our District Attorney.' That's leading me to believe the killer is someone associated with the DA's office, or worse, our department. It would seem logical an unrelated party would say 'your District Attorney.'"

"That makes sense. I assume that means you want to question the entire staff of those departments."

"Correct. If that is fruitless, it could be any other town government organization."

"That would be an awful lot of work."

"And, if I happened to have a helper, and that helper was the killer..."

"Do you believe Detective Gallagher is above suspicion?"

"What I believe really doesn't matter, does it sir?"

"No. I suppose not. I gather that goes for everyone in the department?"

"Yes, sir. Including yourself and Chief Irving."

"I understand. I'll clear it with the Chief, and probably the Director of Public Safety as well. Let me know when you want to interview the two of them, I'll take care of getting that set up for you."

"Thank you, sir. Obviously, as soon as possible. It's going to take some time, and I expect some push-back from the DA's office as well."

"I'll ask the chief to touch base with Mayor Price to clear the road for you. It would be very useful if you could clear Detective Gallagher quickly so you can farm out some of the lower-level personnel interviews to him."

"Understood."

"Give me a day to work my way up. You can come grill me after lunch tomorrow. Sound good?"

"Yes, sir. And I'm sorry it has to come to this."

"No stone unturned. You'd be remiss if you didn't make this request."

"Thank you, sir."

Gennaro headed back to his desk to talk with Simon. Afterward, he explained the reason he needed to grill him fairly hard.

"I get it. It's a big job and if you tried to do it yourself, it would take an awful long time. I'll start with the Admin Assistant, then hit the patrol officers. I agree that it's best if you handle the sergeants and leaders."

"Thanks. And I'm really glad I was able to clear you, it would have been uncomfortable working together if there was any remaining suspicion. We'll get through our folks before we move on to the DA's office. We'll need to spend some time in Bangor to get through all of them."

"Same there, I'll take the support staff, and you handle the attorneys themselves?"

"Sounds like a plan. But Captain Paris will get Chief Irving to talk to the mayor to clear the road there. It might take a couple days."

"It'll probably take us a couple days just to clear our department."

It did. Three days later, they started hitting the DA's office. Johnson Patrick, the District Attorney was very forthcoming, making sure all his people knew they had to comply. The second day they were there, one of the ADAs was unexpectedly missing. DA Patrick attempted to make contact with the man, but his cell phone was turned off, and there was no answer at his home. It appeared they had their first person of interest.

Nestor Medina was the newest attorney on the staff, having been there less than a year. A complete background check on him uncovered a few questionable gaps in his employment history. Especially interesting were the three months before he joined the DA staff here in Penobscot County. The arson trial when Keller was acquitted fell in that window of time. DA Patrick indicated his explanation upon hiring was a sick relative. Unfortunately, that was taken at face value. No record of any direct relatives hospitalized or otherwise being ill could be located. Simon wrote up the request for a search warrant. Warrant in hand, they went to the address on record.

It appeared no-one was home, but appearances could be deceiving. They had to be careful because the investigation found that Nestor owned three guns. Two handguns and a shotgun. Their caution paid off. After knocking on the door, a gunshot sounded, blowing a hole through the door mere inches away from Simon's knocking hand. Person of interest immediately escalated to primary suspect. They quickly retreated to their car for cover and Simon called for backup.

"D-2 to dispatch."

"Go D-2."

"Officer needs assistance at this location, shots fired. Home of a one-eighty-seven suspect, with possible hostages."

"Roger D-2. P-2 and P-4 in route. ETA, three minutes."

"Roger that. D-2 out."

Gennaro turned on the PA system, "Nestor Medina. This is the Orono police. Come out with your hands up and no-one has to get hurt."

The response was swift and vicious. Another gunshot, and the front passenger window of their car exploded.

"Nestor, at least let your wife and son go."

"She took him and left me. I ain't coming out vertical."

"Let's talk about this some more. We don't know for sure if you killed anybody."

"Yeah, sure. You don't know who I killed."

The detectives looked at each other, unsure what Medina meant.

"We think you killed Adrian Keller, but nothing has been proven yet."

"I killed him. Mother fucker burned down my dad's property. Dad let the insurance lapse. It broke him. He killed himself two weeks ago. Keller deserved what he got."

"That's no reason for you to get killed."

Another gunshot in response. Rear passenger window gone.

Patrol car number two arrived with its two officers. Gennaro had them station themselves to the right of the house. When car number four arrived, that officer was assigned the left side. P-1 responded as well, taking the street behind with a view of the back door.

Gennaro tried again, "The house is surrounded, Nestor. There's no way out. Just come out with your hands up."

Nothing happened for about three minutes. There was some hope that the conflict would end peacefully when the garage door went up. Nobody immediately came out. After another minute, Nestor appeared and walked in front of the car in the garage, a pistol in each hand.

"Drop the guns, Nestor. Nobody wants you to get hurt."

Nestor took aim and fired toward Gennaro's car. Detective Gallagher's shoulder was visible above the trunk, fortunately, his head was not visible behind the rear windshield. Medina was a good shot. Gallagher flew backwards; his shoulder hit by a round. That was the only shot Medina was able to fire. Saggio and all three patrol officers out front fired. One of the officers made the call immediately.

"Shots fired. Officer down. Need an RA forthwith at this location."

Gennaro went over to his partner.

"Hang in there Simon. Help is coming."

"It hurts like a motherfucker, Gen."

"I know it does. You're not bleeding badly. Looks like a small caliber, probably lodged between bones. You'll be fine."

Gennaro applied some pressure to the wound.

"Arrrrghhh!"

"Sorry, gotta try to staunch the bleeding."

"I know. But that hurt even more."

The ambulance arrived and the EMTs took over. After Gallagher was stabilized and loaded into the ambulance, Gennaro slowly worked his way to the suspect, kicking the guns away. There was no need. Median had taken two shots to the chest and a third to the neck. He likely bled out in ten or fifteen seconds.

Simon Gallagher recovered completely; aside from some soreness in his shoulder when it was wet. A complete search found a Bernzomatic torch and Oxy/MAP-Pro fuel in Nestor's garage. The search also uncovered another body, Nestor's wife Hannah. After a few phone calls, Russell Medina, ten, was located at a friend's house, after a sleepover. Neighbors reported hearing two loud bangs earlier that morning, but none suspected they were gunshots. Hannah had been shot twice.

A couple odd things were discovered as well. Nestor's father did not own the building where the fire was, nor had he killed himself. The detectives wrote that off as the product of a deranged mind. Case closed.

The End?